Is the BBC a cherished national institution and major curator of the nation’s cultural assets or just one more mass media provider of information and entertainment, among many? The Government’s White Paper on the future of the BBC’s royal charter was widely expected to take the latter view. But it has come down closer to the former, which is a relief. Above all, the BBC’s independence from government control seems to have survived.

Yet the BBC’s powerful role in national life does need examining from time to time to ensure it serves the public interest. It is after all funded by a form of taxation, the annual licence. This form of funding raises two problems. To whom is it accountable for how it spends its £3.7bn licence fee income? Neither the White Paper’s proposals nor the corporation’s own controls seem equal to the task of clipping some of the BBC’s more extravagant wings, including the salaries of senior executives. And what is the impact of its subsidised operations on rival media organisations which must raise their own income commercially?